Citing literature and making reference lists

A bibliographical reference must contain enough information to enable a reader to identify and find the source. It is furthermore important that this information is presented in a consistent manner.

The following guidelines are based on the Harvard Referencing System, also called the author/date system.

Reference management software such as Endnote or Reference Manager are good tools for keeping track of one’s bibliographical references. The UMB University Library arranges courses on the use of these programmes for staff and students.

1.1 Inserting references in a textIn all articles, papers and theses, one often has to refer to texts written by others. There are certain rules for making such references. Furthermore, the reader must know where to find the complete bibliographical information. These are organised in a reference list, which is ordered alphabetically by the author’s last name.

The citation must include the author’s name, year of publication and page(s) covering the discussed topic. Based on this information, a reader is able to obtain the publication in question by referring to the complete bibliographical information in the reference list.

References can be incorporated into a text in many different ways. Often, it is a god idea to use various strategies. For example, a reference to something you read on page 3 in a book by Smith, published in 1990, can be written in one of the following ways:

• In her study on mad cow disease, Smith (1990 p. 3) states that ... • Smith (1990 p. 3) claims that mad cow disease is caused by ... • As shown by Smith (1990 p. 3) ... • In the book ”Mad Cow Disease” from 1990, Smith (p. 3) states that ...

Sometimes you have to refer to a large number of pages. In such cases, it is sufficient to refer to a chapter, section, etc.

• Smith (1990 chap. 4)

From a reader’s point of view, including the page number(s) is ideal. However, text references very often only refer to author and year.

1.2 Multiple authorsWhen referring to one, two or three authors you can cite all of them, in the same order in which they are listed in the original publication:

• According to Smith, Avery and Jones (1985 p. 3)

If a text is published by four or more authors, only the first author is mentioned within the text. Use the abbreviation et al. (from Latin et alii, meaning "and others") to indicate that there are more authors. However, all authors must be listed in the reference list, even if the citation in the text reads Smith et al.

Occasionally, three or more authors publish several articles within the same year. In this case, you must refer to the authors in the same order in which they appear in the original publications.

In this case, one should not use "Smith et al. (1985)", since this leaves the reader guessing which document to refer to in the reference list.

Some authors are productive and publish numerous articles within a single year. When referring to two (or more) of such articles, you must add a, b, etc. to distinguish between them:

• Smith (1990a p. 113) and (1990b p. 217) clearly indicates that ...

If two authors with the same last name have published an article in the same year, use their first-name initial to distinguish.

• Both A. Smith (1990 p. 3) and B. Smith (1990 p. 46) agree that ...

If two or more authors are cited at the same point in the text then they are included in the same in-text citation, separated by a semicolonn e.g. Several researchers (Avery 2000; Brown 1991; Smith 2003) found that...

1.3 Secondary sourcesSometimes one has to refer to a secondary source. This implies referring to a primary source via another (secondary) reference (ie an author refers to a work you have not read). This should be avoided, but at times it may be impossible to obtain the primary source. However, it must be clearly stated in your reference that you you have not seen the book/article you are referring to.

In the reference list, both documents must be completely cited. The reference of the original document must contain a note showing the source reference.

1.4 Documents without year of publicationWritten sources without a year of publication can be cited by using the abbreviation s.a. (Latin: sine anno – without year):

• Smith (s.a. p. 5)

2. Citing non-written sourcesNon-written sources, such as films and videos, can more or less be cited like written sources – stating author and publishing year. The same applies to electronic (online) documents, however, for such documents, the complete bibliographical reference must also include the URL address and the localisation date (date on which you viewed the document online).

Personal communications are cited in the same way as other sources within the text, but are not included in the reference list. A personal communication can be a letter, memo, email, an interview, an informal conversation or a telephone call.

3. How to make a good reference listAll cited literature must be included in a separate reference list, and ordered alphabetically. The objective of such a reference list is to enable readers and library staff to obtain desired literature as easily as possible.

The two main rules for reference lists are: 1. All literature referred to in the text must be included in the reference list. 2. All of the references in the reference list must be found as citations in the text.

3.1 BooksA reference to a book with a personal author shall include the following information:

Author’s last name, first name (or only first name initial), year of publication, book title, place of publication, publisher, perhaps number of pages.

The year of publication can be distinguished by a period and/or parentheses. The book title can be in italics. The order of place of publication and publisher can be reversed. The main thing is that all information is presented in an orderly, consistent manner. For books that have been issued in several editions, the reference must state which edition was used.

If you have several references to the same author, you can replace the author’s name with a dash in the second and following references. You can also choose to repeat the name. In either case, be consistent. The oldest publication is listed first.

For more than one author, list first author with last name first, the following authors with first name first. However, this may vary. Sometimes all authors are listed with last names first. Again, the main thing is to be consistent.

It is often practical to use an ampersand (&) between two or more authors. Thus, one avoids having to take the language of the publication into consideration (og, and, und, etc.)

For Norwegian edited publications, ‘Editor’ (Ed.) is replaced by (red.), for German publications by (Hrsg.). No words of the book’s title should be abbreviated. The trend today is an increasing use of lowercase characters in English titles .

3.3 Publications issued by organisations/institutionsWhen an organisation or an institution acts as ”author” and publisher of a book or document, it is common practice to list the organisation’s name as the ”author”.

• United Nations. Department of Economic and Social Affairs. (2001). World public sector report: globalization and the state . New York, United Nations. 184 p.

If such a report was prepared on assignment by one or several authors, but is issued as part of the assigning institute’s publication series, you can choose if you want to refer to the author or the institution.

3.4 Master thesesAn example of a reference to a Master’s thesis submitted at UMB

3.6 Articles in journalsThere are specific referencing rules for journal articles. Remember that the names of journals can be abbreviated according to specified standards. These standard abbreviations can be found, e.g., in BIOSIS Serial Sources and ISDS List of Serial Title Word Abbreviations. If you choose to use the abbreviations in BIOSIS Serial Sources, you can add a period between the various parts of the abbreviations. The ISSN Portal is a useful electronic tool for finding the complete titles and standard abbreviations of journals. To access the database, you must be linked to the UMB network.

Single-word journal titles are not abbreviated, e.g., Naturwissenschaften. The present trend is to write out fully the names of journals, thus avoiding problems associated with abbreviations.

A complete reference to an article from a journal/periodical should include:

Author’s last name, first name (or only first name initial), year of publication, title of article, name of journal (preferably in italics or bold), volume, pages (from:to).

The issue number must be included only if each issue starts with page 1, otherwise it is not necessary. Do not include words such as Binding, Issue or Volume. The Issue number should be written in ordinary Arabian numerals, even if written in Roman numerals in the original.

3.7 Online documentsThe access to online documents, i.e., documents in electronic form on the Internet, is increasing. The problem with referring to such sources, however, is that one cannot be sure of how lasting they are. Websites can either be changed or completely disappear. It is thus advisable to cite printed documents as much as possible.

In addition to the usual bibliographical information, references to online documents should also include the URL address and the localisation date (date on which you viewed the document online).

4. Alphabetical orderWhen using the Harvard Referencing System, a reference list of all used sources (books, articles, online documents, etc.) shall be compiled and ordered alphabetically by the main author's last name or a corporate name. References by the same author are sorted by year of publication. These principles enable readers to find complete information about the literature cited in the text. References without an author are inserted in the alphabetical order by their title.

Please observe:Many journals issue Instructions to authors, which must be followed when submitting papers for publication.

6. Links to other templates for setting up reference listsThis guide briefly describes the essential features of the Harvard referencing system. Below you will find links to some useful online sources which were used in the compilation of this guide.

• Mauch, J.E., Birch, J.W. (1993). Guide to the successful thesis and dissertation : a handbook for students and faculty. New York, Marcel Dekker. 345 p.

8. Using reference management software to make reference lists - EndNote or RefManReference management software is specially designed for storing literature references in a personal database. These programmes are also useful tools when writing articles, theses, etc. Such software can insert references from the database into the text and generate a reference list. There are several programmes available. UMB has site licenses for EndNote and Reference Manager. This means that all UMB staff and students are granted access to these products. We recommend students to use EndNote, whereas PhD students and researchers are recommended to use either EndNote or Reference Manager.- Read more

8.1 EndNote styles for Master’s thesesThe Harvard System of Referencing is often used in MSc theses (author-date method). A Harvard style follows the EndNote software, but we do not recommend using this style. The UMB University Library has developed a Norwegian and an English Harvard style for EndNote. If your thesis advisor does not specifically recommend another style, you can download and use one of these styles in your MSc thesis.- Read more

8.2 Styles for scientific journalsNote that many scientific journals have their own rules for how to cite literature and present reference lists. Such journal-specific rules must be followed. The reference management programmes include a variety of different styles for your use.

9. Difference between manually and automatically generated reference listsIn the reference management programmes such as EndNote and RefMan one has to specify a language when selecting a style. For example, if you select English, (ed.) is used for edited publications. If you select a Norwegian style, (red.) is used for edited publications. In the manual mode, however, the rules described in 3.2 Edited publications are applied.